Chapter Six
VALENTINO
I stand at the far end of the operations floor the next morning with a coffee that has gone cold in my hand.
It's a busy day. Analysts update dashboards. Screens flicker with new alerts. Everything moves according to the systems I designed.
I watch it all without really seeing any of it because my attention keeps pulling toward the compliance wing where Livia De Luca has already been working for forty minutes.
She arrived early. Earlier than I did. That alone should not impress me. People try to impress me every day and most of them fail.
Yet here she is at her temporary desk in conference room B with her hair pulled back neatly and her focus locked on the screen in front of her. No nervous chatter from her today or the quick jokes she makes to fill the silence.
Just steady work.
I walk closer without announcing myself. Through the glass wall I see the revised profiles she promised.
Two family case studies from the Aurelius brief. She has marked them up heavily.
I push the door open and step inside.
Livia looks up. Her expression stays professional, but I catch the quick inhale she tries to hide.
"Mr. Ferretti," she says. "I have the revisions ready. Would you like to review them now or should I send the file first?"
"Now." I take the seat across from her.
She turns the screen toward me and begins walking through the changes. Her voice is clear and measured.
She kept every single data point I required.
The threat vectors remain intact.
The financial structures have not been altered. But the framing around them has shifted completely.
Where my original language spoke of asset protection and risk mitigation she has written about safeguarding the private lives that exist behind public fortunes.
She describes how succession planning is not merely about share transfers but about preserving the fragile trust between a father and the daughter he no longer understands.
She talks about protecting the small rituals that keep a family intact when the outside world sees only wealth and headlines. The language feels personal without becoming sentimental. It feels human.
I hate that it works.
I read further. One paragraph stops me.
She has taken my cold assessment of a particular family's recent divorce volatility and reframed it as a moment when protection must extend beyond physical safety to emotional continuity for the children caught in the middle.
You'd think the words would sound soft. Instead, they sound precise.
They sound like something a client might actually trust with their most guarded secrets.
I set the pages down. "You changed the tone without weakening the substance."
She watches me carefully. "The substance was already strong. The tone was scaring people away before they could see it."
I lean back in my chair.
The conference room feels smaller than it did yesterday. Her scent reaches me across the table. The coconut lotion mixed with something light and warm that doesn’t belong in these sterile spaces.
I force my gaze back to the screen.
"This might be enough to move the needle with Aurelius," I admit. The words taste unfamiliar. I don’t hand out praise easily and certainly not on the second day of employment. But facts are facts.
Livia does not smile in victory. She simply nods once as if she expected nothing less. "I can revise the remaining profiles by end of day if you want the full set aligned."
"Do it." I stand up. "And prepare to defend every word when we present. They will push back."
"I know." She meets my eyes directly. "I am ready for that."
I leave the room before I do something stupid like tell her how rare it is for anyone to change my mind about anything. Especially this quickly.
Back in my office I close the door and pick up the phone. Griffin Calloway answers on the second ring. His voice carries the easy confidence of a man who has spent years cleaning up other people's messes in courtrooms and boardrooms alike.
"Valentino. To what do I owe the pleasure this early?"
I sit down at my desk and keep my tone neutral. "Three quick questions. Professional advice. Off the record for now."
Griffin pauses. I can almost hear him straightening in his chair. "Go ahead."
"First. What complications arise when hiring the daughter of a direct business rival?"
He exhales slowly. "Depends on the rival. And how much bad blood already exists. You thinking of Dante De Luca? Because if you are I need you to tell me right now."
I don’t confirm it. "Second question. What are the firm policies and legal exposure around relationships with employees? Direct reports specifically."
Griffin goes very quiet. "Valentino."
"Third. Confidentiality obligations regarding an employee's dependents. Child. Single parent situation. How far can I press for details without crossing lines?"
"Jesus Christ." Griffin lets out a laugh that contains zero humor.
"You hired her. You actually hired Dante De Luca's daughter and now you are asking me about sleeping with her and digging into her kid. Do I have that sequence right?"
"I did not say that."
"You didn’t have to. I’ve known you for years. You don’t ask vague questions. You ask because something specific is already happening."
His voice turns sharp. "Hey, don’t touch her. Not once. Not even if she throws herself at you. HR nightmare. Lawsuit risk. And that’s before we get to Dante.
“Don’t interrogate her about the child either. You start asking about her son and she’ll smell an agenda from a mile away. Single mothers in high pressure jobs already walk a tightrope. You make it worse and she walks or she sues. Or both."
I rub my temple. "And the rival situation?"
"Dante submitted his own proposal to Aurelius two weeks ago. He’s pivoting hard into family security.” He coughs.
“Sorry–so he sees it as the next logical extension of his logistics empire. Private transport. Secure relocation. Now personal protection.
“He wants this contract badly and will use every connection he has. Including his daughter if he can get to her."
I absorb that information in silence. Dante entering my field directly changes the stakes. It also explains why Livia looked so strained when she mentioned family pressure.
Griffin continues. "Don’t start a war with him without ironclad evidence.
You go after Dante you gonna need proof of illegal activity or you risk everything you’ve built.
And for God's sake don’t let this woman become the battlefield.
Hire her for her skills. Keep it professional.
Or fire her today and save us all the headache. "
"I am not firing her."
"Of course you are not." Griffin sighs. "Look. I like you. I respect what you built. But I’ve seen this movie before. Powerful man. Complicated woman. Sex. It ends in flames, my man. Usually with my firm cleaning up the ashes. Keep your distance."
When the call ends, I lean back and close my eyes.
Griffin's warnings are serious, but they do not change the facts. Livia is the best compliance strategist I’ve interviewed. The revisions she produced this morning prove it. I need her for the Aurelius pitch.
Everything else I will manage.
The morning passes in meetings.
I review threat reports from Singapore and London. I sign off on new safehouse protocols for a client in Zurich.
All of it feels routine until I find myself thinking about Livia again. Not her work this time.
My head is stuck on her legs as she walked ahead of me during the tour yesterday. The way her skirt moved. The curve of her mouth when she argued with me about emotional language.
She talks too much when she feels cornered, the words spilling out like she can build a wall of them between us.
I imagine shutting her up with a kiss. Pressing her back against the conference table and tasting all that nervous energy until it turns into something else entirely.
I stand up abruptly and walk to the window, but can't register anything outside of it.
I’m furious at my own mind for wandering there. She's my employee. She has a child. She's Dante De Luca's daughter. Any one of those reasons should be enough. All three together should make the idea impossible.
Yet my mind is traitorous, picturing her bent over that desk, happily taking every inch of me.
I force the thoughts down. They have no place here.
Mid-afternoon my assistant forwards a new email. The Aurelius Consortium has made their decision on finalists.
Three firms including ours have been invited to a ten-day immersive evaluation at their private estate in the Hudson Valley.
Live scenario presentations. Family interaction simulations. Full access to decision makers in a controlled environment. Attendance is mandatory for key team members.
I read the details twice. This is the opportunity we need. It’s also a complication I did not anticipate.
Ten days.
Ten days inside a private estate with a hand-selected team operating under constant observation from one of the most selective clients in the world.
I lean back slowly in my chair and stare at the attached itinerary.
They’re not simply hiring a security firm.
They’re looking for people they can trust inside the walls of their lives.
Which means Griffin was right about one thing.
Livia’s revisions may have just become the reason we stay in this competition.
A knock sounds against my office door before I can think further.
Sofia steps inside holding a tablet against her chest. “You saw the Aurelius notice?”
“Yes.”
“They want team confirmations by tonight.” Her eyes sharpen slightly. “You already know who you’re bringing?”
I do.
That irritates me more than it should.
“Core operations,” I say. “Myself. Chen. Alvarez. Two analysts. Livia for compliance strategy.”
Sofia studies my face for one second too long.
She has worked with me for six years. She knows exactly how rarely I hesitate over personnel decisions.
“And Dante De Luca’s daughter attending a ten-day live evaluation with us doesn’t concern you?”
“It concerns me professionally.”
“Mhm.”
Sofia walks further in and sets the tablet down on my desk. “I reviewed her old case files after HR flagged the De Luca connection.”
I look up sharply. “And?”
“She’s clean.” Sofia shrugs. “Actually, cleaner than most of the executives in this building. No suspicious transfers. No unusual contact with Dante’s companies. Her financial records are a mess, but in the normal single-parent way. Late rent. Medical debt. Childcare expenses.”
Something cold twists low in my chest at that.
Medical debt.
“She’s struggling,” Sofia says quietly. “Real struggling.”
I hate that the knowledge affects me immediately.
I hate that my first instinct is not strategic caution but the sudden irrational urge to make sure she never has to look worried again.
Dangerous, that instinct.
Sofia heads for the door and when she leaves, the office feels quieter than before.
I print the invitation and walk to conference room B. Livia looks up from her laptop when I enter. She has made more revisions. The pages are spread across the table in careful order.
"We received this." I place the invitation in front of her. "Finalists attend a ten-day retreat next month. Hudson Valley estate. You will be required there."
She scans the document. Her shoulders tighten visibly. "Ten days. That's a long time."
"It is non-negotiable. Every firm brings their top people. We present live scenarios. No remote option."
Livia sets the paper down slowly. "I can't do ten days away. I have responsibilities at home."
"Arrangements can be made. Childcare. Travel. Whatever you need. Ferretti Global will cover it."
She looks at me then and something in her eyes hardens. "Powerful men always think arrangements solve everything. Throw enough money at the problem and the woman falls in line. I’m sure you believe that works."
The words hit harder than they should. I step closer to the table. "This is business. Not personal power. The contract is worth more than any single person's comfort. Including mine."
She stands up. We face each other across the narrow space. Her cheeks have gone slightly pink.
"My son is four years old. He does not understand contracts. He understands that his mother comes home at night. I won’t disappear for ten days because you snapped your fingers and made arrangements."
Her mouth is right there. The way she speaks when she’s angry makes me want to close the distance and stop the flow of words with my own. I want to know the taste of her morning coffee on her tongue. I want to see how she looks when I pull back, lipstick smeared across her mouth like a bruise.
I take one careful step back and breathe.
"Consider the options,” I say, my voice a bit hoarse. “We leave in three weeks. I expect you to find a way."
Livia reaches for her folder to gather the revised profiles. Her hands move quickly. One folder slips. A small photograph slides out and flutters to the floor between us.
I bend down and pick it up before she can.
The image shows a young boy. Maybe four. He sits on a park bench holding a bright red toy car in both hands.
It feels like he stares directly into my eyes through the photo and I wonder where I get this vague sense of familiarity.
No, not vague. It's strong. A strong familiarity.